This is your child writing to you and as shocking as it may be that I’m using the old method of communication, it’s the only way I can. We have never really engaged on an emotional level. I’m writing this letter to explain why I am always quiet and why I changed from the “bubbly girl” you knew to one who abstained from talking and engaged myself in solitude.

I feel that this is the only way I can express myself without you questioning me like, “What’s wrong? Do you wanna talk bout it?” or adhering to the house rule of “No one keeps things to themselves”. So it’s better to write it down. I’m not sure where to start though because there are some things that I forgot. I have healed and moved. I’ll just write the most hurtful thing that happened to me, which resulted to me being who I am now.

The incident happened while I was in high school, grade 8 to be exact. That’s where I learnt to ‘keep to myself’. There was this classmate, whom I thought was my friend, let’s call her Lucy for the sake of my story telling. She was a bit older than me, matured too; the reason being because she was held back twice. We planned that on a certain day we would go out to a party. I’m not sure if you remember when I told you that “there was a school camp for 2 days, regarding literature studies” – I lied. You allowed me to go to that camp because you said “I want you to be successful”. I remember it was on a Friday, as it was her birthday, and I’m not usually allowed to go out on weekends .

The Thursday was spent preparing for the party (the first day of camp). Friday came, and surprisingly a lot of people came to the party. This was very overwhelming seeing that I was young and inexperienced. That day to me was more of “there’s a first for everything” type of day. I was at my first official party – not like those parties you guys would organise for my birthday. This party had DJ’s, locally-known performers, even free alcohol. Everything was so new for me.

I was at the lounge admiring the party and music. I was mostly alone at the beginning of the party, because my friend was busy checking to see if everything was in order. But after some time, Lucy came and chilled with me and we started drinking. I was already tipsy after 2 glasses because of my inexperience with alcohol. Lucy left for a while and after a few minutes she came back and told me that we shouldn’t be drinking alone at her party. That we “needed some company, and people to loosen up with.” I felt that statement had something behind it, but I didn’t want to overthink as I was kind of drunk.

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Tell us: Have you ever lied to your parents and faced terrible consequences because of that lie?